10 SEO Lies That Will Not Give You the Results You Expect

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The internet is evolving rapidly and has made it possible for everyday people to start their own companies without the need for an office.

An internet connection, combined with a laptop or desktop computer, is now all it takes to start something on the internet that may bring you some extra cash at the end of every month.

Unfortunately, while some people are succeeding and rising to the top ranks, others are struggling and are unable to make even a single dollar on the internet.

The difference between a person who is making thousands of dollars on the internet and one who is hardly earning anything is usually the way that they promote their website online.

While having a website that is optimized for conversions is an important part of being successful on the internet, a website cannot be successful and cannot make any money if it doesn’t receive an adequate supply of high-quality traffic.

There are both free and paid methods for driving traffic to a website.

When it comes to paid methods, website owners usually turn towards advertising platforms, such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads and Facebook Ads to drive traffic to their website.

In such a case, the website owner would usually pay the advertising platform every time someone clicks on their ad.

When it comes to free traffic; social media marketing, content promotion and guest posting are often the most preferred methods.

In addition to these internet marketing strategies, search engine optimization is another particularly important technique that should not be overlooked.

This technique involves implementing certain strategies to push a website and its pages up in search results for targeted keywords; thus gaining exposure on search engines such as Google and Bing.

The Most Popular SEO Lies and Why You Should Not Believe Them

When it comes to search engine optimization, you will see quite a lot of mixed opinions on the internet.

One person will tell you to do something and another person will advise you to not do that specific “something” that you just read about.

The truth is, there are certain techniques that work and others that don’t.

In this post, we are going to focus on ten of the most popular SEO lies regarding search engine optimization that are often being told on the internet – and then we’ll tell you why you should not believe them.

1. Content Length

The first SEO lie we would like to point out is the numerous posts that tell you that all of your content has to be around 500 to 750 words in length.

Take a look at some gigs on Fiverr and other similar platforms, especially those that specialize in SEO services.

You’ll notice that the majority of the “SEO writing” services offer 500 word articles. This is because many people advise that articles on a website should be 500 words in length for best results.

Anything below 500 will get you penalized – yes, you will often see such claims as well.

The truth is, Google wants your website to look as natural as possible; thus you shouldn’t have a lot of articles on your website that all fall within the same word count range.

Instead, vary your content length. Some articles can be less than 500 words, while others can be over 2,000 words. However, the truth is, a 500 word article will most likely not rank well in Google.

After analyzing as many as 1,000,000 web results, Backlinko found that the average word count for a web page that ranked #1 was 1,890 words.

2. To Rank In Google, Your Domain MUST Include Your Keyword

Another lie is that you need to include your keyword in your domain name if you wish to rank well in Google.

This is a claim that has been made by quite a lot of people, but there is not much truth to this.

The truth is, while it may be beneficial to some degree to have your keyword included in your domain name, you are still able to rank number one in Google even if your domain does not include your primary target keyword.

The truth is, Google considers your keyword placement in other locations more important.

Thus, you should rather focus on registering a domain that contains your brand name.

Then place your target keywords in post titles, image captions, image alt tags and, of course, in the headings and body of your content.

3. Thousands of Social Signals Will Get You a Top Ranking

Social media platforms have taken the world by storm and they are now more popular than any other types of websites on the internet.

Facebook has more than 1.94 billion active users. Twitter now has over 317 million active users. Instagram, Google Plus, LinkedIn and other social networks are also widely used today.

You will often find that people are offering “bursts” of social signals from these websites. And they will tell you that that the thousands of signals they are able to offer you will get you a high ranking.

Yes, social signals do account somewhat for rankings – but in an indirect way. Buying 10,000 Facebook social signals for $50 is not going to get you that #1 spot you are after in Google.

4. Content Syndication Improves Your Rankings

You will often see bloggers and other internet marketers recommend syndicating the content of your blog to certain services. This allows other people to publish your content on their blogs as well.

There are ways to play it safe when it comes to content syndication, such as ensuring your site is mentioned as the author of the content.

Stevan Mcgrath is a digital marketing professional who possesses expertise in brand design and development. Stevan is passionate about utilizing his diverse skill sets for new and innovative online marketing strategies. He has worked as a freelancer and a contributor to ProvenSEO. Despite having a wide influential reach, he seeks client satisfaction as his topmost priority. He also writes blog posts on recent digital marketing trends. To know his work and more details you can follow him on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+.